Those of you with a good ear (or a good otaku 6th sense) might have noticed that, in our first meeting, one character in almost every anime we showed had the same voice. That's right: Rei (Eva), Pai (3x3), Tira (BH), and Tomoko Saeki (DNA) all have the same voice actress, namely Megumi Hayashibara. I know that there have been many articles on voice actors, but this is such an amazing phenomenon that I just had to write about her. And since, according to the annual Animage magazine readers' poll, she was voted the most favorite voice actress for the last 4 years (she kept her throne even after the actress and actor categories were consolidated 3 years ago), I thought this blurb might be of some interest to CJAS. Indeed, she is the hottest voice actress in Japan right now; she does the voices for the top 3 characters in Animage's monthly popularity poll for the past 3 months: Lina Inverse (Slayers), Rei Ayanami (Evangelion), and Lime (Saber Marionette J).

Miss Hayashibara is 29 years old and actually worked as a registered nurse before she started taking acting lessons. She made her debut in 1986 in the first Maison Ikkoku episode as kindergartner A (does anyone remember from CJAS 2 years ago?). Since then, she's gone on to many popular roles; the role that got her the most recognition was probably in 1988 when she played Himiko in Wataru: the Legendary Majin Heroes (a series that was explosively popular among girls but somehow didn't make it here -- I could only find one web page). To date, she's done over 80 roles, 13 main character roles, including the female Ranma, and at least 9 major supporting roles.

This week, she does voices for characters in all of our shows except MB and BGC 6! Can you recognize her in BGC 5?